Chest to Chest
by Brooklyn's Dollhouse
Summary: Callie waits - every night she waits for that moment that brings her hope in all the darkness that has followed the plane crash.


This is my frist time writing a Calzona story, but after the episode last night, I needed to try my hand at this couple and I hope you all like it.

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Grey's Anatomy. This is just for fun, and no copyright infringement is intended.

The song quoted is Ryan Shaw - Morning, Noon and Night

* * *

The darkness and silence that fills their bedroom sets her on edge. She looks at the clock and watches as it slowly ticks further away from midnight, and closer to the part that keeps her up at night. All night –every night. She doesn't sleep anymore – she waits. She waits for the soft whimper to reach her ear, before she turns her head. The same heartbreaking sight meets her eyes time and time again and it never fails to break her heart. Her wife's face twitches and her lips tremble. She watches Arizona fight the same battle every time darkness falls, and all she wishes for is for Arizona to win just once. But the part that rips her apart is when the screaming starts. Those terrified, soul crushing screams are what get her the most - screams so filled with pain that it chills Callie's soul.

She wants to reach out and touch her more than anything - to take her into her arms and plead with Arizona to wake up, but she did that once and it didn't end well. So, now she waits. Callie lets her own tears flow freely, but quietly, because in all honesty, she couldn't stop them even if she wanted to. Arizona's pain is carved so deeply into Callie that she finds herself unable to separate them in moments like these.

She can't think of anything she wouldn't do to take away Arizona's pain.

But she doesn't know where the pains ends and she begins anymore. Her best friend is dead and her wife has become a shell of the person she was a month ago.

Her life has changed. It turned on a dime, and now she finds herself pushing the boulder uphill all by herself. And those screams are the most discouraging. They drag her to the brink of exhaustion every night, taunting her, tormenting her, and she comes within a hair's breadth of giving up, but that is when it happens. She doesn't know why it even surprises her anymore, but the electricity that shoots through her body is like a full on assault on her senses.

It stops her world without failure, and for a moment all she feels is the soft touch of her Arizona's fingertips playing in the palm of her hand.

The screams turn back to whimpers, and Callie knows Arizona is about to move. It is subtle at first, and always an unconscious move, but in her sleep Arizona moves to her side, coming face to face with Callie.

It is the first step, but it doesn't take long for her to worm her way across the distance, and mold herself to Callie's body. Never once has Callie told Arizona about their nights, because she doesn't know what she will make of it, and Callie desperately needs the comfort Arizona's unconscious actions brings her. She doesn't think she will survive this whole mess if that was to be taken away from her.

"Ca…Ca…" Callie watches her wife swallow, trying to force the word out of her dry throat. "Callie."

Arizona isn't awake, and Callie knows it. It is simply Arizona reacting to hearing Callie's heartbeat beat steadily beneath her ear. It is almost like she recognizes the rhythm, and she should. No one, besides Sofia, has such a huge impact of the pace of her heart. They have the ability to speed it up to levels she barely survives, or in moments like this, bring it down to a beat that works to calm both of them.

"Callie, Callie…please." Callie doesn't know what Arizona means, but she says it every night. She pleads with Callie in her sleep, while her fingers curl and tighten in Callie's t-shirt.

"Sshhs," Callie murmurs gently in Arizona's ear, and soothingly places a hand on her wife's hip, pulling Arizona's lower body closer to her.

Arizona whimpers again, and buries her face further into Callie's chest.

"Arizona?" Callie always checks that Arizona isn't awake. "Arizona, can you hear me?"

She never gets an answer. Those nightmares have a hold on her that is stronger than Callie's soft whispers, and Callie can't stop the small string of words that starts flowing from her mouth in these moments. Everything she wishes she could tell Arizona during the day, she finds herself confessing at night. Some might argue that it is unhealthy, but with her wife lying wrapped up in her arms, her need to share, to connect with Arizona overrides all other considerations.

"Sofia misses you," Callie turns her head slightly, just enough for her cheek to rest on Arizona's forehead. "She really misses her mama."

Callie picks up Arizona's left hand and slowly lets her thumb glide over the cool metal of Arizona's wedding band.

"She's looking for you. She is waiting for you." It takes everything in Callie not to raise her voice, but she desperately doesn't want to wake the sleeping blonde. "Arizona, she needs you. We both need you."

"Can you just… can you just… can you come back to me? Come back to use?" Callie knows it is ridiculous to ask her wife to come back, when in reality she hasn't gone anywhere - physically at least, but mentally she has never felt more removed from Arizona than she has lately. "I'm so sorry, Arizona. I'm so, deeply, deeply sorry for what happened to you. I'm so sorry."

Arizona moves abruptly, causing her left leg to fall fully against Callie and reality once again smacks her in the face. She wishes so badly that she could go back into that OR and have things turn out differently, because breaking that promise to her wife is the single hardest thing she has ever had to do. Never in her life has she felt more helpless than when she realized that there was nothing she could do for Arizona. There was nothing to save, and it had devastated Callie. She doesn't know how she will ever be able to operate on a femur again without throwing up.

She tried a week ago, and almost fainted, because Arizona's sorrow filled eyes kept flashing before her. Having those eyes haunt her in the OR was never something she had counted on happening.

"She's…" Arizona's voice once again breaks the silence. Her body starts to fidget and her head moves up closer to Callie's neck. "They're wai…Mark… they're…home."

"Honey," Callie whispers, "just take it easy. You are right here. You are safe. I've got you."

"Callie," Arizona murmurs, her body relaxing once again, her lips millimeters from Callie's pulse point.

"That's right," Callie encourages her sleeping wife. "I'm right here."

"Lliope…" the last part of Callie's name washes over Callie's neck like a cool summer breeze and Goosebumps appear on her arms.

Carefully, Callie detangles herself from her wife's body and moves down on the bed until she comes face to face with Arizona. Chest to chest, nose to nose, her body gradually lines up with Arizona's. She takes her wife's hand and brings it up to her lips. She holds Arizona's palm against her lips, brushing feather like kisses against the soft skin she finds there.

She lays Arizona's hand flat on her chest, placing it directly above her heart. "I love you."

Arizona doesn't even stir, and she dares to repeat her words. "I love you."

"You and Sofia are my world - my entire world, Arizona. My sun literally sets and rises on the two of you." A lone tear crawls down Callie's cheek, and she brushes it away. "Mark's dead. My best friend is dead and if… if."

Callie rests her forehead against Arizona's, their breaths mingling in front of them. "I can't lose you too."

Arizona's face twitches and Callie holds her breath, studying her face for any signs that she could be waking up, but as soon as they appear, they disappear again. She is still sleeping. Callie knows the medicine plays a huge part in how much, and how heavily her wife sleeps.

"I chose you and you chose me, remember?" Callie whispers to her wife, trying to remind her of their wedding vows. "We stood up there in front of our friends and family and promised each other forever. And I want forever. I need forever with you Arizona, because anything less simply won't do. And even then I think you might be stuck with me in the afterlife, because forever in this life, isn't really that long."

Callie licks her lips, and sneaks a hand in between their bodies to find the hem of Arizona's shirt. "I need it to be us that argue over which college Sofia should apply for in eighteen years. I need it to be us that embarrass her at graduation with our crying and cheering, but more importantly I need it to be you sitting next to me at some beautiful retirement home in sixty years."

Callie chuckles. "I promise I'll even give you a free card to flirt with a nurse once a month - hands off though."

She lets her index finger trace gently over Arizona's bottom lip. "Just don't be too hard on them. We can't have you making our nurses all flustered with that super magic smile of yours."

She scoots a little closer and kisses the dimple on Arizona's left cheek. "And those dimples, baby. I swear they could stop war. They sure make my heart stop whenever they appear."

Callie sighs. "You are magical, honey. Don't ever forget that."

Callie wraps her right arm around Arizona's waist and brings their bodies flush, not an inch separating them. She lets her hand glide up Arizona's back until her fingers tangle in her wife's hair. This embrace is what she has waited for all day, and it is easily the highlight of her nights.

She kisses her wife's lips.

Her eyes get wetter and the tears that find their way down her cheeks this time tastes salty on her lips. She pulls her mouth away from Arizona's before the warm water pulls Arizona from her sleep.

"Please, just know how much I love you." Those are the last words Callie utters, before a soft cry flows through the monitor on the besides table.

Sofia is awake. Callie glances at the clock on Arizona's bedside table and the bright red numbers tell her that it is only three AM. With a quite sigh, she crawls out of bed and walks out of the bedroom and into her daughter's nursery. She finds Sofia tossing impatiently from side to side, arms reaching out in front of her as she searches for comfort.

Callie bends over and carefully lifts her daughter into her arms. "Sssh, baby girl. It's okay… mommy's got you."

She cradles Sofia against her chest and rocks her gently, trying to coax her into sleeping, but nothing happens. "You need a clean diaper, huh? You think that will do the trick?"

Callie knows it won't. The only thing that will do the trick is Arizona's comforting arms, but that isn't an option. It hasn't been an option ever since that fatal crash almost stole everything from Callie and Sofia.

"I took a minute, had to sit right back," Callie sings softly, as she lays Sofia down on the towel, pulling her diaper off. "Cause I am giving loving with my heart attached."

Sofia stops fussing long enough for Callie to manage a genuine smile. "And I never knew that it could be like that. Loving you the way I do."

She gently cleans Sofia, while quietly singing the song she danced to at her wedding -her and Arizona's first dance as wife and wife.

"So whether morning, noon or night. Whenever baby I'm feeling alright." Callie places a soft kiss on Sofia's stomach, before putting on the clean diaper. "And I am staying with you, long after loving is through. Morning, noon and night."

Callie carefully places Sofia back in her onesie, but as soon as Callie stops singing Sofia starts crying again. "I know, baby, I know."

She takes her daughter in her arms, and slowly walks around the room, trying to calm the young girl. "You want your Mama. I know you do."

"Mama," Sofia cries, looking at Callie. "Mama."

Her daughter's plea for Arizona breaks her will and she takes Sofia's baby blanket out of her crib and wraps it around Sofia, before she walks both of them back to Arizona's and her bedroom. She turns the handle carefully, trying her hardest not to wake her wife, but what she doesn't count on is finding Arizona sitting up – fully awake.

Callie stops in her tracks. "Hi."

"Hi," Arizona says gently, and Callie feels her knees buckle at her wife's soft tone. She hasn't heard that in a while.

"You are awake." Callie doesn't move from her spot at the door, caught in a limbo. She doesn't know what to do with this. Sleeping Arizona she can handle, but an awake Arizona is like a ticking time bomb.

Arizona folds her hands in her lap and licks her lips, before titling her head in the direction of the baby monitor. "Sofia was crying."

It doesn't really surprise Callie that their daughter's cries is the only thing that can get though to Arizona.

"Still is," Callie says, placing a hand gently on the back of her daughter's head. "She…She…umm."

"I know." Callie's eyes meet Arizona's over the top of Sofia's head. "Come here."

Callie's heart flutters in relief at Arizona's request and she walks over and hands Sofia off to Arizona. Callie moves around the bed and crawls in next to her wife and daughter, taking a second to appreciate the scene before her. This was all she had in mind when she stood in that OR a month ago, getting a chance to see this meant more than anything else ever had. And she had fought hard to keep her family intact.

Yet, a part of her still feels like she is waiting for the verdict.

"Hi, big girl," Arizona mumbles against Sofia's cheek. "Shouldn't you be sleeping?"

Callie smiles when Sofia reaches out and grabs Arizona's shirt between her fingers. "Haven't you told mommy that all this crying is really just a ploy to get to sleep in bed with us, huh? Or are we planning on keeping that a secret?"

Arizona's soft voice slowly lures Sofia back to sleep and within minutes she is fast asleep on Arizona's chest.

"Arizona…." Callie starts, but when Arizona lifts her gaze from Sofia, she stops.

"Shhs," Arizona murmurs, while gently placing their daughter down between them. "She is sleeping. No talking."

Callie reaches across Sofia and grabs Arizona's hand. The force of Callie's grip clearly startles Arizona.

"I love you." Callie intertwines their fingers and for the first time in a month, Arizona lets her.

Arizona looks down at their hands, when Callie continues. "I know everything looks dark and hopeless right now, but you and I? We are going to pull through. We are going to come out on the other side of this and we'll be stronger, because we are meant to be. Do you hear me? You and I… that's a forever kind of deal."

Arizona nods, squeezing the warm hand clutched to hers.

"You can yell, and you can scream all you want, but I'll never leave your side. I don't care how many mountains we have climb to get to the other side of this….we'll get there even if I have to carry us all the way. I'll do whatever it takes, Arizona. You and I don't get to give up… ever."

"Okay," Arizona whispers, and Callie uses her free hand to raise Arizona's head, forcing their eyes to connect. "Okay."

"Okay," Callie echoes, and for the first time since Arizona opened her eyes in that hospital bed, almost four weeks ago, she feels a tiny ray of hope shining down on them.

**The End. **


End file.
